What did I bring home from my office?

The last time I left my office, after 8 years of going there, most days arriving at 9 and not stepping out until 6, I was surprised that more hadn’t accumulated. Well, so much had accumulated: boxes and bags of donated supplies, over a hundred art books from a community member who had left us for the next life. As I looked high and low across the city scape of shelves, I remembered so vividly strolling to her apartment on a warm June day and being let into the space by her friend not knowing that it was possible a single New Yorker could occupy one such lofty unit. She had used it well.

The office could have been quite lofty, but the walls were always closing in with memories of moved on kin, and this gift from that holiday (we celebrated many from across the globe) and a few drawings that looked great, but never got finished. We were proud of the rough draft though. It was a work-in-progress because we were always working to progress, to take a little more care with a little less time.

It all felt like Tetris and I wanted to do my diligence to not contribute to the mess, though metaphorically and literally I know did in some way.

What I gathered at 7pm on that last day was one bag full, packed precariously, and containing:

~ the 5 cup coffee pot that has followed me since college. If I was going to produce I was going to need to start with my own coffee, getting my hands on it, one step at a time, and then making more later if I needed. When I had time I liked to watch it percolate, thinking that that was how my best ideas would arrive, but my best ideas always flew in with the desires of the people that called or knocked. I am sure I will have a hard time making things happen for myself like I did for other people, even though I still make the same coffee in the same pot.

~ the cup bearing the emblem of my alma mater that I would never buy. I asked another Alumni, much more esteemed than me, to teach for our organization and she brought it for me on our last class. How good it felt to be seen as a peer of sorts with artists I admired and to have a monument of that on my desk to look at each day.

~ three daily planners for years come and gone, covered from top to turn, every page, with text and symbols, so full that most people might see them and think they indicate something sour, an overload that exceeds expectations. The scrawlings are hard to decipher, but most pages include checklists fully checked. We were always an analog office and that was how I specifically felt connected to the art of work. Slight of hand could turn an a to an @ so I needed to note how fast I was writing. Allowing such awareness was hard, especially when calls were coming in. Monday morning my hand would streak down the pages like a hot rod on the highway, and by Friday I’d be creeping in the margins, multitasking too much, and begging for the clock to strike six.

~ slacks and shirts in case of emergency meetings that might slip my mind on the days I arrive dressed down, or big spills, or leaks. I would on occasion need to damage control my leaky human nature, but I always left my strong face at home. Even if my shirt seemed to say “I know all the answers”, cut from a wrinkle free cloth, my mouth never did. I never knew all the answers as an assistant or a manager. Some days I wondered if I should, or if I should pretend to, but there was no time to pretend. There should have been time to learn more, but most days there wasn’t.

~ the little gold Buddha that Karrolyn gave me after our last panel discussion together in October. “Always such composure and such good questions. The kind of questions that I don’t jump to answer but really make me think about things from my own perspective.” An artist who changed me, giving me a token to remind me to continue to transcend, to grow. She and everyone I told seemed so happy for me when the last week arrived.

~ the very last thing I take, nestled under an accumulation of business cards, is an absolutely oversized wrench that Evelyn Yee brought to me. She had found it abandoned in the subway. When she presented it with that sly smile that took over the fullness of her face, she said something like, “you like to solve problems. I can’t wait to know what kind of problems you’ll solve with this!” And then she laughed and laughed, and we talked about the gorgeous cards she was making. She was always, always making things for others, and that’s what I wanted to be doing too. That is what I am doing in a different way.

Even after I hang up my keys and julienne my company card, I don’t feel any less burdened. I look around. What else do I take? The comfort, the regularity verging on complacency, that my best friend applauds me for giving up.

“One of the things I am in awe of the most about you, you show up to give and when what is being taken outweighs what you can give, well, then you don’t give anymore. You leave, you change, even if that’s going to be unfamiliar. You can feel safe without knowing what to expect.”

And when I am finally walking out at 7pm with my work bag and a second bag that now contains my work life, only one of my colleagues remains at her desk, so diligent. She has outlasted us all. And together we take a moment to dream together, to reminisce, and to hug and to hug again, as the florescent lights continue to render us fallow in this one part of our lives where we know each other most. I think I feel I will be back.. but the way that sentence came out…what I think and what I feel, they are different.

When her plans change, and she is called to pack up her work life, she will let me know, and I promise to keep in touch and I intend to. I am leaving, I intend to, but I will still be present every day when my alarm goes off with what I have seen there, where I am no longer going.